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Category: Imagination, The Individual & The Artist

A big thanks goes to my friend John for bringing this topic up.
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For the record, these were not created by me. They are just being shown for individuals to be able to identify them in their daily lives.

What is a logical fallacy?

A logical fallacy is a flaw in reasoning. Strong arguments are void of logical fallacies, whilst arguments that are weak tend to use logical fallacies to appear stronger than they are. They’re like tricks or illusions of thought, and they’re often very sneakily used by politicians, media, and others to fool people. Below follow some of the more common fallacies.

StrawmanMisrepresenting Someone’s Argument To Make It Easier To AttackBy exaggerating, misrepresenting, or just completely fabricating someone’s argument, it’s much easier to prevent your own position as being reasonable, but this is kind of dishonest and serves to undermine honest rational debate.Example: After will said we should put more money into health and education, Warren responded by saying he was surprised that Will hates our country so much that he wants to leave it defenseless by cutting military spending.

Slippery SlopeAsserting That If We Allow A to happen, then Z will consequently happen too, therefore A should not happen.The problem with this reasoning is that it avoids engaging with the issue at hand, and instead shifts attention to extreme hypotheticals. Because no proof is presented to show that such extreme hypotheticals will in fact occur, this fallacy has the form of an appeal to emotion fallacy by leveraging fear. In effect the argument at hand is unfairly tainted by unsubstantiated conjecture.Example: Colin Closet asserts that if we allow same-sex couples to marry, then the next thing we know we’ll be allowing people to marry their parents, their cars and even monkeys.

False CausePresuming that a real or perceived relationship between things means that one is the cause of the other.
Example: Pointing to a fancy chart, a Senator shows how temperatures have been rising over the past few centuries, whilst at the same time the numbers of terrorist attacks have been increasing; thus global warming causes terrorism. [Don’t believe me? Look it up – an actual senator that said this.]

Ad HominemAttacking your opponent’s character or personal traits in an attempt to undermine their argument.Example: After Sally presents an eloquent and compelling case for a more equitable taxation system, Sam asks the audience whether we should believe anything from a woman who isn’t married, was once arrested, and smells a bit weird.

Special PleadingMoving the goalposts to create exceptions when a claim is shown to be false.Example: Edward Johns claimed to be psychic, but when his ‘abilities’ were tested under proper scientific conditions, they magically disappeared. Edward explained this saying that one had to have faith in his abilities for them to work.

Loaded QuestionAsking a question that has an assumption built into it so that it can’t be answered without appearing guilty.Example: Grace and Helen were both romantically interested in Brad. One day, with Brad sitting within earshot, Grace asked in an inquisitive tone whether Helen was having any problems with a fungal infection.

The Gambler’s FallacyBelieving that ‘runs’ occur to statistically independent phenomena such as roulette wheel spins.Example: Red had come up six times in a row on the roulette wheel, so Greg knew that it was close to certain that black would be next up. Suffering an economic form of natural selection with this thinking, he soon lost all of his savings.

Bandwagon Appealing to popularity or the fact that many people do something as an attempted form of validation.Example: Shamus pointed a drunken finger at Sean and asked him to explain how so many people could believe in leprechauns if they’re only a silly old superstition. Sean, however, had had a few too many Guinness himself and fell off his chair.

Black-Or-WhiteWhere two alternative states are presented as the only possibilities, when in fact more possibilities exist.Example: Whilst rallying support for his plan to fundamentally undermine citizens’ rights, the Supreme Leader told the people they were either on his side, or on the side of the enemy. [Note: George Bush did this by the way…]

Begging The QuestionsA circular argument in which the conclusion is included in the premise.Example: The word of Zorbo the Great is flawless and perfect. We know this because it says so in The Great and Infallible Book of Zorbo’s Best and Most Truest Things that are Definitely True and Should Not Ever Be Questioned.

Appeal To NatureMaking the argument that because something is ‘natural’ it is therefore valid, justified, inevitable, good, or ideal.Example: The medicine man rolled into town on his bandwagon offering various natural remedies, such as very special plain water. He said that it was only natural that people should be wary of ‘artificial’ medicines such as antibiotics. The converse is also true, which could be in a way called Appeal To Technology/Science.

Composition / DivisionAssuming that what’s true about one part of something has to be applied to all, or other, parts of it.Example: Daniel was a precocious child and had a liking for logic. He reasoned that atoms are invisible, and that he was made of atoms and therefore invisible too. Unfortunately, despite his thinky skills, he lost the game of hide and go seek.

Anecdotal Using personal experience or an isolated example instead of a valid argument.Example: Jason said that that was all cool and everything, but his grandfather smoked, like, 30 cigarettes a day and lived until 97 – so don’t believe everything you read about meta analyses of sound studies showing proven causal relationships.

Appeal To EmotionManipulating an emotional response in place of a valid or compelling argument.Example: Luke didn’t want to eat his sheep’s brains with chopped liver and brussels sprouts, but his father told him to think about the poor, starving children in a third world country who weren’t fortunate enough to have any food at all.

The Fallacy FallacyPresuming that because a claim has been poorly argued, or a fallacy has been made, that it is necessarily wrong.Example: Recognizing that Amanda had committed a fallacy in arguing that we should eat healthy food because a nutritionist said it was popular, Alyse said we should therefore eat bacon double cheeseburgers every day.

Tu QuoqueAvoiding having to engage with criticism by turning it back on the accuser – answering criticism with criticism.Example: The blue candidate accused the red candidate of committing the tu quoque fallacy. The red candidate responded by accusing the blue candidate of the same, after which ensued an hour of back and forth criticism with not much progress.

Personal IncredulitySaying that because one finds something difficult to understand that it’s therefore not true.Example: Kirk drew a picture of a fish and a human and with effusive disdain asked Richard if he really thought we were stupid enough to believe that a fish somehow turned into a human through just, like, random things happening over time.

Burden Of Proof Saying that the burden of proof lies not with the person making the claim, but with someone else to disprove.Examples: Bertrand declares that a teapot is, at this very moment, in orbit around the Sun between the Earth and Mars, and that because no one can prove him wrong his claim is therefore a valid one.

Ambiguity Using double meanings or ambiguities of language to mislead or misrepresent the truth.Example: When the judge asked the defendant why he hadn’t paid his parking fines, he said that he shouldn’t have to pay them because the sign said ‘Fine for parking here’ and so he naturally presumed that it would be fine to park there.

No True ScotsmanMaking what could be called an appeal to purity as a way to dismiss relevant criticisms or flaws of an argument.Example: Angus declares that Scotsmen do not put sugar on their porridge, to which Lachlan points out that he is a Scotsman and puts sugar on his porridge. Furious, like atrue Scot, Angus yells that no true Scotsman sugars his porridge.

GeneticJudging something good or bad on the basis of where it comes from, or from whom it comes.Example: Accused on the 6 o’clock news of corruption and taking bribes, the senator said that we should all be very wary of the things we hear in the media, because we all know how very unreliable the media can be.

The Texas SharpshooterCherry-picking data clusters to suit an argument, or finding a pattern to fit a presumption.Example: The makers of Sugarette Candy Drinks point to research showing that of the five countries where Sugarette drinks sell the most units, three of them are in the top ten healthiest countries on Earth, therefore Sugarette drinks are healthy.

Middle GroundSaying that a compromise, or middle point, between two extremes is the truth.Example: Holly said that vaccinations are safe, but her scientifically well-read friend Caleb said that this claim was untrue because there were dozens of studies proving otherwise. Their friend Alice offered a compromise that vaccinations are sometimes safe.

Imagination…
Can Imagine Nations…
As cells within a Universe…
Where You and I Verse …
At the University …
Thence muse, within Universe Cities
And detach a bit yonder…
Thus, we go on and wonder…
…about the meanings of life..
And how synchronicities are rife…
With the greatest of rapture…
When we go recapture…
All that’s beyond our vision …
Like a intensely soft submission….
To all that is mind-numbing, yet real…
Like when consciousness reveals…
Our real eyes…
That realize…
Real lies…
that unseal cries…
and often crystallize…
Where the profound inner sanctum is found…
Thence promptly then unbound …
Slowly towards infinity …
Wholly spawning affinities…
A Youniverse of possibilities …
Where we dream, manifest …
Of worlds not oppressed…
Thence journey on a quest..
Where there is ceaseless freedom…
Those shadows? We don’t need ’em …
To the gallows we’ll thus feed ’em …
Because they really wouldn’t treasure …
What they really couldn’t measure …
What is priceless; what has meaning…
And they kept on falsely leaning…
On all truly material …
Rather than the wondrous ethereal…
That helps us feel surreal …
That shows life’s true bliss…
As we all journey on through this…
Door way of our soul …
Finding out what makes us whole …
Reaching now the door way…
We go my way? We go your way?
Our key – Imagination …
You’re free – endless creation…

“Negative emotions are like unwelcome guests. Just because they show up on our doorsteps doesn’t mean they have a right to stay.”
– Deepak Chopra

This idea of this post was in response to an avalanche of negative comments on a particular video.

In said video, evidence was discussed and particular theories bandied about. Said theories prompted two separate tidal waves of emotion: positivity and negativity.

In particular, the negativity wasn’t just random venting, or just having a different point of view. The negativity came in the form of personal attacks. That’s a very precise type of negativity. It came out in full blown hatred through most comments as a matter of fact. This tidal wave of emotion left many people feeling dejected.

Whether the video was accurate or incorrect, isn’t the point of this analysis. What the point of this observation is how much time is spent being wasted by the mere act of spewing negativity over the course of that individual’s life.

The nascent point in this observation is 30 minutes a day. This seems like a reasonable assumption given that there are many people that spend much more time than that spewing hatred, literally every day.

To this we will multiply this by 365 days, and ultimately by 50 years of life.

Here’s the math:

30 minutes a day of complaining

30 minutes * 365 [days] = 10950 minutes

10950 minutes x 50 [years] = 547,500 minutes

547,500 minutes / 60 [to get total hours] = 9125

9125 hours / 24 [to get total days] = 380 days

Please keep in mind, these numbers are conservative. Some people will spend a lot more time than this, sometimes a few multiples of that.

The higher the quality of consciousness of an individual, the lower the probability of them engaging in errant negative behaviour. Not everyone is like that though.

After that tsunami of negativity that took place, it makes me wonder how much time the average person in their life takes part in this type of negativity. And to be more precise, this isn’t just random venting and such. Am talking about precise ad hominem attacks fueled by hatred/ignorance. The kind of substance that deteriorates the soul of an individual. That also doesn’t cover many of the detrimental side effects of negativity such as stress and such.

All of this is just food for thought.

This whole event is definitely something quite noteworthy, even if it is just a piece a larger puzzle.

It truly makes curious as to all of the things that drive people to choose to act in such a manner.

Regardless of what takes place, don’t allow the actions of other individuals to mar your inner sanctum.

Be mindful.

“Don’t be victimized by negative emotions and thinking. Don’t be handicapped by stubbornness and inflexibility.”
– Dr. TP Chia

Below are several quotes from respected individuals which allude to the importance of simplicity.

The reason for these is to contemplate them deeply and ruminate about what prompted them to make such statements. This should gives us an insight, no matter how limited, into the thinking/understanding that these individuals displayed in their daily lives:

“Simplicity is the ultimate form of sophistication.”
– Leonardo Da Vinci

“If you can’t explain it simple enough, you can’t understand it well enough.”
– Albert Einstein

“Beauty of style and harmony and grace and good rhythm depend on simplicity”
– Plato

“Simplicity is the keynote of all true elegance.”
– Coco Chanel

“Life is really simple, but we insist on making it complicated.”
– Confucius

“In character, in manner, in style, in all things, the supreme excellence is simplicity.”
– Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

“Be as simple as you can be; you will be astonished to see how uncomplicated and happy your life can become.”
– Paramahansa Yoganda

– Simplicity will stand out, while complexity will get lost in the crowd.”
– Kevin Barnett

“The ability to simplify means to eliminate the unnecessary so that the necessary may speak.”
– Hans Hoffman

“The greatest ideas are the simplest.”
– William Golding

– “If you can’t explain it to a six year old, you don’t understand it yourself.”
– Albert Einstein

“It is not a daily increase, but a daily decrease. Hack away at the inessentials.”
– Bruce Lee

“Truth is ever to be found in the simplicity and not in the multiplicity and confusion of things.”
– Isaac Newton

“Nothing is more simple than greatness; indeed, to be simple is to be great.”
– Ralph Waldo Emerson

“Very often, people confuse simple with simplistic. The nuance is lost on most.”
– Clement Monk

“How many undervalue the power of simplicity! But it is the real key to the heart.”
– William Wordsworth

“Any intelligent fool can make things bigger and more complex…it takes a touch of genius – and a lot of courage to move in the opposite direction.”
– Albert Einstein

“Embrace simplicity…Be content with what you have and are, and not one can despoil you.”
– Chris Prentiss

Every day we have plenty of opportunities to get angry, stressed or offended. But what you’re doing when you indulge these negative emotions is giving something outside yourself power over your happiness. You can choose to not let little things upset you.
– Joel Osteen

“Simplicity is realizing what you need rather than what you want.”
– Apoorve Dubey

In our current day an age, there is an excess of complexity which plagues the populace. We have all dealt with many issues which harbor extreme complexity to the hilt. Much of it is out of our hands; not all however.

If the complexity is overdone, this leads to all manner of detrimental circumstances which are harmful to the individual, waste their time, and increase their stress.

As is often the case, for many issues there are solutions that can be viewed far easier if one just takes a step back and analyzes the situation from a detached point of view [POV]. Although not taught in conventional schooling, the mental tool of seeing things from a detached macro-POV is extremely useful for being able to see how different things interlock in the grand scheme of things rather than viewing things from a 1st person limited POV.

Allow me to repeat Paramahansa Yoganda’s incisive quote that might be of great use to most of us in the current world we live in: “Be as simple as you can be; you will be astonished to see how uncomplicated and happy your life can become.”

If ever there were a quote that precisely relates how people would be best served, this one would be one of them.

Its so simple, its elegant. And it would solve countless problems and ameliorate stress as well.

After seeing a post from another fellow blogger [and am thankful for this person for doing it, because its prompted this very post], it occurred to me that although daily goals are a part of my life and have helped me greatly when employed, it hadn’t occurred to me to write my goals for 2016.

For myself, am of a mind that every day should be lived to the fullest extent. That might not always be possible, but if we keep that notion in the back of our mind it’s a lot easier to accomplish a lot more by gravitating towards that which drives us in life.

“In an entire 168 hour work-week where the average person spends, 56 hours a week sleeping, and 40 hours a week working, that leaves one with 72 hours free. If one were to spend 35 hours a week viewing television, then that would leave 37 hours of free time. That’s nearly half ofall of one’s available time spent watching television. That seems ludicrous, does it not?”

That’s a lot of free time that could be used doing something else besides watching tv.

On the flip side of that, my niche is reading. Reading, reading, reading and more reading. Reading things of many genres and about countless topics. Sprinkle some writing around that and still we got some reading. This is how assimilating so much information becomes simpler.

The other thing is that, at the back end of my life, the thought of having spent so much time doing something that brings almost nothing of real value would mean a life half wasted so to speak. That’s just not acceptable. We’re here to kick ass, take names, and blow the lids off the box of mediocrity. Anything else would just be selling my-self short.

In any case, here are the goals:

– Continue fostering the great relationships that have helped me grow as an individual.
– Meet new people, and learn as much as possible not only from them, but from the paths that they have chosen to walk, regardless of their reason.
– Be even more inquisitive than in the past
– Follow my instincts all of the time, no matter how big or small the issue might be.
– Read 100 books, or 20,000 pages within books. Whatever comes first between those two. [This does not count pages read by articles/papers researched]. As an inquiring mind, am always looking for more ways to learn more so…
– A side goal to above is that 10 of the 100 books need to be philosophy books.
– Read 1500 articles health, science, finance, history, etc.
– Write at least 50 book reviews for the blog. This is to help give back to others.
– Write 50 poems of any type. This one is mainly to keep promoting my personal creativity.
– Paint 50 paintings. This one am new at [and am incredibly thankful for Jon Rappoport for mentioning it quite often], but it’s still something that like writing and poetry, helps vault imagination forward. So onward we will go.
– Workout for minimum 30 minutes a day at least 5 times a week. Health is a very important aspect of my life, and slacking here would be highly detrimental.
– Take my time before carrying out all decisions in my life. This will be the most complex, but it will yield the greatest results. It is also a very general goal, but it actually will couple to every part of my life.
– Lastly, continue to add content to the blog and grow the blog up to at least 500 regular readers. Its been great being able to interact and see how much variety there is to be had within the interwebz blogosphere realm, so am looking forward to more.

Most of these goals revolve around helping others as others have helped me, as well as pushing myself beyond my current state of mind/health/life.

Hall delves into the finer strands of all that is metaphysics, religion and spirituality in a way that’s easy to comprehend for a novice, and yet sophisticated in depth for people that have interested in the subject for quite a while and are searching for more substantial information.

Beginning with the true and false paths to wisdom, Hall picks apart many of the aspects that can be confusing for people given how much information is out there. Keep in mind, the original version of this book was published in 1936, with the updated version revised in 1963.

That being said, the information is still quite pertinent given the unfortunately slow [spiritual] development of most of society at our current moment.

Hall speaks of the importance of learning from the ancient teachers – the upper echelons of ‘an unbroken metaphysical tradition’. Teachers such as, Plato, Aristotle, Hippocrates, Plutarch, Pythagoras, Proclus, and many many more. He even mentions some books which are vital to sift through and learn from that should be part of any student/researcher’s library.

Throughout the length of the book, Manly P. Hall talks about the importance to be able to hone in much of the misinformation/disinformation that is prevalent in this field, and he even gives thorough advice as to how to go about doing that.

Hall analyzes the seven requisites for a person of character, and thence goes into how to go about seeing what type of mystery schools are out there.

Ultimately, Hall goes into the importance for the individual to work on [spiritual] self-mastery above all. This notion is harpooned from countless angles and highly cautioned upon given the fact that the modern world religions, so called ascended masters, and even modern mystery schools, all attempt to tell you what to think, and not how to think. This is why Hall focuses so much on being discerning in this particular abstruse field.

Many great things have been said about this book, and for good reason. It offers valuable information that can save you a lot of precious time that can be used incisively elsewhere.

If you are familiar with Manly P. Hall’s work, then you know the realize the high quality of his information. And if you don’t, you really ought to take a gander at it. It will be well worth your time.

To finalize, will leave you all with a snippet of the author’s mentality:

“Philosophy elevates man to the level of truth, creating within him the capacity to sense and to realize, to visualize and to comprehend.”
– Manly P. Hall